


Taking Care of It

by Nebulad



Series: Whiskey Molotov [3]
Category: Fallout 4
Genre: Angst, F/M, No actual spoilers, Suicide mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-24
Updated: 2015-11-24
Packaged: 2018-05-03 06:07:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5279663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nebulad/pseuds/Nebulad
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Radiation’s a real bitch,” she said, shaking her head.</p><p>“She can’t leave everyone this good looking,” he said, grinning over at her. She leaned in and kissed him and his guts did that fluttery thing that he liked better than psycho.</p><p>“If anyone in the world was gunna turn out this handsome after being exposed to that many rads, I’m not really surprised it was you,” she said, and he got the weird feeling again like she meant it. </p><p>“Yeah, well, if it’s all the same let’s avoid any rad pits- I haven’t met a feral yet that I’d wanna look like,” he said, putting his arms around her as she dug through an old suitcase.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Taking Care of It

“Hey Hancock?” Audrey asked pleasantly, wiping bug guts off the front of her shiny new metal chestplate. He grunted to let her know he was listening, trying to lockpick an abandoned chem box. He didn’t know why he didn’t just wait for her to do it- he had the trembles real bad in his hands, which was why he used a shotgun and a knife. Not a lot of finesse required. “Are there any other pre-war bugs that’ve fucktupled in size, or have we settled on mosquitoes and flies?” she asked.

“Don’t forget radscorpions,” he reminded her, stepping aside as she gently nudged him away from the box. She had it open in a breath and handed him the old pack of mentats stored within. There were only three left but he didn’t need more than that to tide him over until they hit a settlement again.

“Radiation’s a real bitch,” she said, shaking her head.

“She can’t leave everyone this good looking,” he said, grinning over at her. She leaned in and kissed him and his guts did that fluttery thing that he liked better than psycho.

“If anyone in the world was gunna turn out this handsome after being exposed to that many rads, I’m not really surprised it was you,” she said, and he got the weird feeling again like she meant it. It didn’t make any goddamn _sense_ for her to mean it because he didn’t have a nose and his ears were fused to his head, but Audrey sometimes looked at him like she was seeing someone totally different.

“Yeah, well, if it’s all the same let’s avoid any rad pits- I haven’t met a feral yet that I’d wanna look like,” he said, putting his arms around her as she dug through an old suitcase. She never shoved him away when he got handsy and he _really_ liked that in a woman. Ever since getting ghouled he’d been subject to a lot more rejection than he’d faced as a human and it’d left him sorta… touch starved. There were always people willing to _tour around_ with him a while, but casual sex wasn’t really the same as Audrey sitting back on his lap to inspect an old vase while he settled his chin on her shoulder.

“You like this?”

“S’a pot.”

“It could hold flowers.”

“If you like it, I like it,” he said with a shrug. She tucked it gently into the pack, meticulously organized to prevent fragile shit from shattering. They had an actually surprising amount of glass on them at all times.

“Why would you ever look like a feral?” she asked, letting herself rest for a second and forget interior decorating.

“‘Cuz, sweetheart, it’s a delicate balance that keeps me cool,” he said, kissing around her neck. “Less rads and I’d be human, more rads and I’d be feral.”

“What?” She’d gone all tense and he didn’t like it- he tried to calm her down again, but she was dead set on getting worked up.

It occurred to him that maybe she didn’t even know.

“Ferals are Ghouls,” he explained carefully, receiving hard confirmation that she hadn’t made that connection when all the blood drained from her face. “No one really knows what causes some Ghouls to just… jump the bridge, you feel? It just happens, sometimes.” Shit, he should have known she didn’t know. The first words she’d ever said to him were asking if he was sick. It was actually sort of flattering that she hadn’t drawn an immediate connection between him and some random ferals, actually- as close to a compliment as he’d ever gotten since his face fell off.

“Does that mean you…” She trailed off, but the sentence still stabbed into his chest like a railway spike. For a second he honestly thought that they were through- _that_ was what did them in, that she’d never realized what exactly was kissing her all over before. Now she did and she would drop him back in Goodneighbor and he would never see her again.

“I uh… don’t really know, to be honest. It’s possible, I guess, but like I said no one really… _knows._ Are you gunna be okay?” he asked, trying to aggressively prioritize how pale she’d gone. _He_ didn’t matter, and if she ditched him then it would be her finally coming to her senses. It would wreck him, but he wouldn’t worry about it ‘til he was sitting back in his rotting museum.

She abated the fear when she almost knocked him over trying to squeeze him to pieces. “I thought- I thought ferals were human?” she asked, gripping him so tight that it kind of hurt. She was a lot stronger than she gave herself credit for.

“Yeah, kind of. There’s a link between ferals and humans, and humans and Ghouls, but… Ghouls and ferals are a lot closer,” he said. “Look, I didn’t want to freak you out. I thought you knew.”

“ _Promise_ that you won’t go feral,” she demanded, not lifting her head from his shoulder.

“You know I don’t make promises I can’t keep,” he scolded, trying to lighten the mood a little. It didn’t work and he could feel her ragged breathing against his throat. If she started crying they were gunna have a situation- he had no idea how to deal with that sort of shit.

“ _Promise,_ John,” she insisted, and his arms tightened around her involuntarily. She never called him by his name, though he’d told her what it was. Whether it was habit or consideration for feelings she thought he had, he didn’t really know, but it broke the floodgates for a second and he loved her so much it hurt.

“Look, I ain’t _planning_ on it,” he tried.

“Just promise.”

“No.” He didn’t like the thought of telling her something just to appease her right then. It wouldn’t change anything, wouldn’t stop this conversation from happening and wouldn’t stop him from going feral if karma finally caught up with him all at once.

“All right, look at it this way then- if you go feral, I’m not fighting you,” she said fiercely, her eyes rising to meet his. He frowned.

“You don’t just negotiate with ferals, sunshine,” he argued.

“I fucking know that, Hancock. I’m telling you that if you go feral you’re just gunna have to kill me because I’m not- I’m not gunna just _move on_ again. With Nate I just… _had_ to, you know? And it happened faster because instead of tormenting myself for being at least half in love with you at all times, I had to focus on not getting us killed. I’m not gunna- I won’t do it again,” she insisted stubbornly. He frowned, but she wasn’t looking at him.

“You think it’d be better to let me live like that? All the sympathy in the world to ferals but a bullet in the brain is a mercy for the little gremlins,” he argued. She didn’t say anything, curling up on herself and staring forward with a watery sort of gaze off into the woods. “Hey now,” he started again, gentler. “This is starting to bum me out a little. C’mere.” She shifted over closer to him, so he knew she wasn’t angry. He put his arms around her and held the simple shot of jet out in his palm- she took it almost sullenly, but relaxed immediately. “Feel better?”

“No,” she said, but her limbs were looser and she turned to kiss him. Jet almost always guaranteed that he was gunna get kissed- apparently if you slowed down Audrey’s thought process enough, there was a lot of making out happening.

“We’ll be fine,” he assured her, running his hands up her sides. “Just like we always are.”

“I’ll believe you when you promise,” she said shortly, adjusting her hips a little.

“I’ll believe enough for both of us,” he teased.

. . . . .

Audrey was staring at him like she was about to cut him open to see what his insides looked like- not really the look he wanted from her when he took off his shirt, honestly. “What?” he asked, tossing one of the teddy bears she kept laying around at her. She caught it, not breaking her stare.

“You’re pretty skinny,” she pointed out, and he flexed a little.

“Chems do that- especially volatile radioactive chems,” he said sitting down next to her. She looked off sheepishly.

“That sounded rude. I didn’t mean like… I didn’t mean I didn’t like it, you’re just… maybe we should eat more.” She was half talking to herself and he groaned.

“That isn’t gunna keep me from going feral.”

“I never said it would,” she defended.

“You were thinkin’ it,” he pointed out, and she shrugged.

“It couldn’t hurt.”

“Stop _thinking_ about it. I don’t have enough jet to get you to drop this,” he said, pulling her down to lay on him. She got that sullen look on her face again, but he ignored it because he wasn’t gunna entertain her paranoia and he really had to save what was left of their chems. They were _almost_ to Goodneighbor again, where she could black out if it kept her from freaking out about the feral thing.

“I can’t just drop it!” she insisted irritably. He reached over to grab more jet- fucking saving it all up. If it would get him out of this conversation, she could finish off the stash.

“Some Ghouls live hundreds of years- look at old Kent. He’s as old as you are without the freezer burn. I’ll be fine.” He regretted explaining it to her- he figured it might’ve come up at _some_ point, but he’d just staggered into the conversation expecting she knew what she was getting into.

“The chems probably aren’t helpful,” she pointed out, ironically as she took the drug he offered.

“You think I’m gunna stop taking chems?” he asked. She rolled her eyes.

“If you do it’ll be a tougher fuck than me that makes you… I just want to do _something,_ you know?” she asked, sitting up a little. The jet was _already_ waning and he wished he had something stronger for her so she would quit worrying so much.

“Not a lot you _can_ do.” He wasn’t even worried about it- he’d thought long and hard about it after impulse taking his Ghoul chem, trying to… well he’d been wondering if he wasn’t just gunna off himself and get it over with. He’d decided not to, ultimately, and made his peace with whatever came of his ghoulification.

“I hate that,” she snapped, her body growing tenser. “I couldn’t do anything for Nate and I can’t do anything for you- don’t even know why either of you bother to keep me around.”

“Because it ain’t your job to control everything just right so we don’t get hurt,” he told her, and she looked up at him.

“Ain’t that a little ironic, coming from you?” she asked. He grinned.

“Downright hypocritical, even.”

“Big word, there. You sneaking mentats on me?” she asked, and he gave her some more jet. She took it with less pouting than before and sighed. “I just love you,” she said dreamily.

“Feeling’s mutual, sunshine. Go to bed and quit worrying,” he told her, sitting back. She shut her eyes and exhaled evenly, but he found sleep a little less easy. He stared into the dark for a little while, listening to her breath and the sound of rain against their improvised shelter.

He’d do it, if she wouldn’t, he decided. If he had any time to think before he went feral, he’d solve the problem for her and that’d be that. No complications, no mess- well, maybe some mess, but not one on her hands. It probably wouldn’t be too much better than her doing the job herself, but maybe it was a little bit for him as well. He joked about going feral during battle but when it came right down to it?

He’d take care of it before he hurt anyone. Easy as that.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I had to do it. Like I hate to be THAT GUY so early in the fandom but I had to. Ferals scare the SHIT out of me and I had to be the person to do this.
> 
> I still don't know how to insert hyperlinks into this thing but nebulaad.tumblr.com is me


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